ST. GEORGE – A tie can be looked at many ways, but in soccer it means one point for each team instead of three for the winner and none for the loser. Desert Hills and Snow Canyon tied 2-2 Friday night, each gaining a team point, but both seeing Dixie take over first place as the Flyers beat Cedar 3-0. Canyon View, meanwhile, quietly owns third place and is just off the pace for second after a mercy-rule win over Hurricane.

Here’s a report from the pitch on a Friday night of Region 9 soccer:

Desert Hills 2, Snow Canyon 2 (F/OT)

Thunder striker Walker Heaton brought the game even with 3:13 left in regulation after the Warriors had led the entire second half. The two teams then had several great scoring chances in the first overtime, with goalkeepers Austin Mild (Snow Canyon) and Preston Hodges coming up with several spectacular saves to preserve the tie.

Neither team had any real serious threats in the second 10-minute OT and the game ended anticlimactically with the ball being booted high in the air at midfield as time expired.

“I’m totally happy with what happened tonight – the guys came to compete,” said Thunder head coach Benji Nelson. “We were playing without one of our best scorers in Kelton Holt (one-game suspension), so we had to do a lot of player shuffling. Certainly both teams had some great opportunities in the overtimes, but all things considered, I’m very happy with the way we played.”

Desert Hills is coming off a crippling 4-0 home defeat at the hands of Dixie a week ago (DH had a bye Tuesday). Meanwhile, Snow Canyon had outscored its three region foes 23-0.

“We really wanted a win tonight,” Warrior coach Marc Wittwer said. “We’re not happy with the tie, but take nothing away from Desert Hills. That’s a good team. We haven’t been tested in region until now and we needed this. We still would have liked the win, but this was good for us.”

The Warriors held a 2-1 halftime advantage. Possession in the second half was largely dominated by the unbeaten Warriors and it looked like they may escape Thunder Field with a road win. But Heaton won the ball out of the pack about 20 yards from the goal and managed to get off a clean shot. The hard roller skimmed to the left of the goal and squirted past Mild to tie the contest.

The action was fast and furious in the first overtime as both teams came up with good looks at the goal. Mild started the overtime with a save, then Hodges had two for the Thunder, including a diving stop to his left. Mild then saved one more before the 10 minutes ran out.

Both teams looked spent in the second overtime and neither team tested the keepers with any difficult tries.

The Warriors, who are now 3-0-3 overall and 3-0-1 in region play (10 points) will battle at Canyon View Tuesday afternoon in their next action. Desert Hills, 3-2-1 and 1-1-1 (four points) is home to face Cedar at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

Dixie 3, Cedar 0

The underdog Redmen, who have yet to win a region game, battled the first-place Flyers to a first-half draw. But you can’t keep a good man down, as they say, and Dixie scored three unanswered goals after intermission in cruising to the win.

Andy Rich got the party started for the Flyers and Anthony De Paz scored as well. Rich got a second goal as well and the Dixie defense, behind goalkeeper Kieran Atkin, did the rest.

For Atkin, it is shutout No. 5 on the season, his fifth in a row. The Flyers, who have a bye on Tuesday, improve to 6-0-0 overall and 4-0-0 in region play (12 points) and reside in first place all alone.

Cedar drops to 1-4 overall and 0-3 in region play. The Redmen are at Desert Hills Tuesday night.

Canyon View 8, Hurricane 0

The Falcons scored four goals in each half in mercy-ruling the Tigers Friday night.

Canyon View was never threatened and got a hat trick from Scott Sanders, who now has six goals on the season. Kellen Bowden scored twice for Canyon View and other goal scorers were Jose Larios, Mark Gibson and Marlin Borst.

Matt Bench recorded the shutout for the Falcons, who sit in third place in region with a 4-2-0 record overall and a 3-1-0 record in region play (nine points). Canyon View hosts Snow Canyon next Tuesday, while Hurricane, 0-6 and 0-3, is at Pine View.

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About the Author

Andy Griffin has been in sports media since 1989 and has covered BYU, Utah State and the Utah Jazz as well as all sports in southern Utah. A journalism graduate of USU, Andy has carried on a dual career as both a sports writer and a sports broadcaster and has been heard around the country. He has also been published in USA Today, Sport magazine, The Sporting News, Fairways magazine, the Los Angeles Times and locally in the Deseret News, the Salt Lake Tribune and the Spectrum. Andy was “The Voice of Region 9 sports,” for many years. He also hosted a daily sports talk show for three years called AG in the a.m.
Andy has been married to his college sweetheart Shelly for 28 years and has five children ages 13 to 25.